Savannah Saves the Day: An Easter Egg Hunt Story

Have I ever told you that Savannah is a real sweetheart?

We had an Easter egg hunt in our yard over the weekend. At the appointed hour, three girls raced out the front door in a mad dash to collect as many candy-filled eggs as possible. As they competed for the same eggs, Leila and Colette collided on the patio. The bigger kid came out of the fray with the loot safely tucked in her basket and raced into the backyard in search of more. In contrast, Colette burst into tears and threw her Easter basket, scattering what few eggs she had gathered. Deeply discouraged, she plopped down and refused to rejoin the hunt. While Katie tried to comfort Colette, Leila sailed on ahead, filling her basket to overflowing. (Tell you what, that kid can MOVE when properly motivated. I'm pretty sure she broke the sound barrier.)

Within seconds -- literally! -- all of the Easter eggs were gone. Meanwhile, at the encouragement of her mother and oldest sister, Colette had finally decided to give it another try. But by then it was too late. So she sat back down on the patio, wailing louder than ever. Then, from the back yard, I heard Savannah call out, "Come here, Colette! There's still one over here!" This puzzled me because I knew full well that the yard had been stripped clean of every last Easter egg. So I walked around the side of house and into the back yard to investigate. And there I saw Savannah taking eggs from her own basket, crouching down, and carefully planting them along the fence line. As she did so, she kept shouting out to her little sister, "I found another one!" And "Here's one more!" Eventually, she succeeded in coaxing Colette into the back yard, where she began picking up the eggs Savannah had hidden.

Back on the patio once more, Colette noticed the contrast between her few eggs and Leila's three dozen or so. And once again she burst into tears and threw her Easter basket in the air, scattering its meager contents. Undaunted, Savannah tried a new approach: she ran inside the house, got the bag of unused candy, filled a bunch of plastic eggs with it, and proceeded to hide those in the bag yard for Colette.

Amidst the hubbub and chaos of a hunt for Easter candy, Savannah saw that her little sister was discouraged and defeated. Neither parent said a word to her. She came up with a solution on her own. And gave away her Easter candy. What nine-year-old kid does that? Seriously, who does that?!!

(I'd like to claim that good parenting is responsible, but the truth is, the child was simply born that way.)